Thank Differently. - The power of employee recognition.

Employees who are recognized regularly:

• Increase their personal productivity • Maintain happier customers • Engage their colleagues • Feel more committed • Have a stronger sense of purpose

One of the greatest rewards you can offer a colleague is to acknowledge their contribution.

How to set up an effective ERP

Recognition is important and few initiatives have to be put in place (such as a term of service award or safety award) but you want to add a program to the mix that's easy to manage, cost effective, and has immediate impact on a daily basis. Here are a few suggestions to ensure your program is a success:

1. Create an incentive

It doesn't have to be much but it should be appropriate to your company's budget and culture. It should be significant enough to encourage people to participate and also something that your employees can get excited about. It might be a gift certificate to a trendy restaurant, a trip for 2, movie tickets, or an MP3 player. Even better, set a dollar limit and let them decide what they want.

2. Create the rules and set objectives

How do your employees cash in on the incentives? Are there objectives they need to meet? Again, make it simple. Your employees are more likely to buy in and participate in the program if they can understand it.

3. Communicate, communicate, communicate

Before you launch the program, make sure your employees know about it. A notification email is a good place to start. An announcement at a staff meeting is a great way to show the system and answer questions.

4. Provide management support

Every successful initiative requires a champion. Ensure a member of your senior management team is charged with mentoring and encouraging the use of the system on a daily basis. According to a survey, 59.2% of HR

professionals say that involvement of the management team is the number one contributor to the success of recognition programs.

Giving recognition is a simple act, but the impact can be powerful.

Remembering birthdays and events, congratulating others for reaching their goals, or a pat on the back for doing a great job are all excellent motivators, especially when the praise comes from a peer.

• Kudos "Pat on the Back." This award is used to award employees for good deeds, assistance with challenging situations in the office/classroom or with a community partner. The recipient receives an ink pen and a "Pat on the Back" note of appreciation.

• Kudos "Extra Effort."This award recognizes an individual's special accomplishments or other outstanding activities, where the employee has gone "above and beyond" the call of duty in a particular situation. Recipients receive a "You Make a Difference" duffle bag / lunch bag and an "Extra Effort" note of appreciation.

Different category to be considered for Awards can be:o Teamworko Quality Award Certificate o Customer Service Award o Great Idea Award o Creativity Certificate o High Performance Unit Award

Recognizing Years of Service

A stable and productive workforce is crucial to any organization, public or private. A company should be extremely proud of the dedication shown by its employees and the number of employees who have dedicated many years of service.

While a taxpayer funded organization does not have the flexibility of a private organization in implementing recognition for years of service, it is important that employees know their dedication is valued.

The office can recognize years of service in the following ways:

• Employees serving 1 year with the office receive a 1 year coffee mug. • Employees serving 2 years receive a 2 year desk clock. • Employees serving 3 years receive a commemorative plaque.

• Employees serving 6 years receive a something in Gold and a personal letter from the CEO.

• Employees serving 8 years receive a crystal clock and a personal letter from the CEO.

Appreciation for 10, 15, 20 and 25 years of service will be recognized annually. Recognition for 30 and 35 years of service can be done at the corporate level annually.

Employees Recognizing Employees

Employees have the opportunity to show appreciation to one another through the You Make A Difference Form. This note serves as a quick thank you that can be sent directly from one individual to another. You can request a pre-printed form from your Division's Administrative Secretary.

Have a ballot box and daily at the end of the day each employee has to drop a line of appreciation (Not criticism because appreciation for others is difficult as compared to criticism) for any 1 employee with the reasoning for it.

The reason can be anything varying from Just the way of Wishing good day to having lent a helping hand in his professional work.

This can be a line of appreciation that an external customer passed on for a particular person thru the other also.

This appreciation can be from a person of lower to upper or upper to lower or in the same level also.

These ballots can be accumulated and at the end of the month the person receiving the highest appreciation can be given a suitable title with a certificate of appreciation.

This title can be conferred to him at the tea time in midst of everyone. This can be a half an hour or 1 hour programme where the appreciation received for each employee can be read out if time permits. (One of the Saturdays)

Anybody can volunteer for reading any employee’s appreciation.

This need not involve any financial rewarding but appreciations received for you in presence of all the peers & the HOD itself will give a boost to the employee’s morale.

How to make an ERP Successful

A recognition program does not have to be expensive. The structure of a

recognition program is limited only by your imagination. An effective program

has the following components:

• Fairness

• High visibility and consistency.

To be fair, a program must not favor one employee over another, merely because

of his or her position within the organization, or his relationship with his

supervisor. There must be an effective means of identifying employees who

should be recognized. In many programs, there is an easy means by which

employees can nominate others for recognition. As a supplement to a nomination

program, supervisors can keep lists of notable employee achievements.

Making certain that a program is highly visible helps to ensure consistent

implementation. If a recognition program becomes viewed as management's

"program of the month," nominations will drop and those who are nominated

may well be those who are perceived in the eyes of many to be management's

"favorites." Small, but meaningful achievements may be ignored unless there is a

plan to actively solicit nominees.

Approach towards ERP

The actual rewards can be anything you want. One approach is to have small

rewards initially, and make each employee who receives eligible to receive a

larger reward at the end of the year. Some of the awards to consider include the

following:

• Dinner certificates,

• A trophy or plaque,

• Cash bonus,

• Pizza party thrown in the recipient's honor, or for an entire group that has

done a great job,

• Bonus miles for airlines,

• A "top achiever" ribbon,

• A reserved parking space,

• An extra paid day off,

• Movie passes.

The reward itself should be just part of the process. Recognition can be achieved by having the reward given at a gathering of employees, and by recognizing the award in corporate communications, such as the corporate newsletter or Intranet site.

THE DO'S AND DON'TS OF COMPANY GIFT GIVING

A very effective method for recognizing employee’s contributions to your success as well as promoting loyalty and good performance is to give them a gift! But know the rules:

1. Be consistent from year to year when giving to employees.2. Don’t give gifts of a personal nature: clothing, perfume.3. Don’t give gifts of alcohol; depending on the person, it may be inappropriate.4. Don’t give a basket of smoked meats to a vegetarian!5. Don’t give logo items – not all employees want to be walking billboards.6. Do make your employees know you value them by choosing the right gift.

Acceptable gifts: office-related products, plants, gift certificates, books, magazine subscriptions, theatre, or movie tickets.

MEDIA TO BE USED TO COMMUNICATE THE ERP

Here are the top 4 methods:

1. Company newsletter 2. Employee orientation 3. Posters, flyers and/or table tents 4. Employee handbook Certificates

RIGHT METHOD, TIME AND PLACE TO FACILITATE

Employee Appreciation Day - Employee recognition is more powerful than any other motivator. We all know cash bonuses are spent on bills and many perks are soon forgotten. Personalizing recognition can create a memory and those memories build higher performance. Recognition can take a hundred forms and variations. Here are just a few ideas:

1. Ask an employee to write down six ways they would like to be rewarded. Anything goes. The only rule is that half the ideas need to be low cost or no cost.

2. Schedule lunch dates with employees. Give them an opportunity to select the luncheon site, and use the time to simply get to know them better.

3. Offer a free one-year subscription to an employee’s favorite business magazine and have it sent to their home.

4. Consider a gift certificate entitling an employee to lunch with you or another mentor of his/her choosing for the purpose of being coached on one or more topics.

5. Offer a shopping spree to a local supply store for an employee to get items (no staplers or paper clips allowed) to personalize his/her office or cubicle.

6. Give the gift of wellness. Have a limousine pick up an employee for a full day at a spa. Give gift coupons for ballroom dance, yoga or golf lessons.

7. Give a fun-loving employee a series of On your mark-get set-GO cards that they can redeem at their discretion. For example: Leave work early to go to a movie, or shopping, or play ball.

8. Send a handwritten note of thanks for the completion of a job well done.

9. If an employee stays late/goes above and beyond to complete a project, send the employee and his/her partner to a nice dinner.

10. Purchase a company “toy” your employees would most enjoy; a cappuccino machine, dart board, volleyball court, exercise room.

Component of employee recognition programs range from public appreciation to citations, team celebrations to sponsored family vacations, glittering trophies to colorful badges and cash awards to gift vouchers…All strung together to promote and reinforce the business objectives, values and belief systems of the organization.

Possible categories of ERP as implemented by different companies• Recognition of contribution in technical activities• Quarterly awards to recognize outstanding performers / Managers for

exemplifying and implementing the best practices in bringing order and consistency to the processes.

• Quarterly award for outstanding performance at the assigned job, helping others outside the normal area of responsibility and expending extra effort or making personal sacrifices for the company

• Strong leader award for championing and supporting excellence and reinforcing the company’s values.

• Project award• Service tenure award• Excellence club to 5 employees for adherence in core value and making

Impact on the profitability, customer satisfaction and leasing to substantial financial impact in a year.

• Pathfinder award for exemplary performance • Certificates of commendation• Pinnacle award for waling an extra mile to achieve the organizational

excellence or received a client appreciation• A Spot award for individuals on the operations floor• Best Branch award for maximum sakes with minimum sales return• Best sales branch manager award for maximum sales turnover• Best collection branch manager to boost collection• Best network development branch manager for getting maximum dealers /

distributors & retaining old dealers)• Top 3 sales executive award• Best employee in each dept (Quarterly)• Consistency award• Wall of fame• Extra Mile club award

Ways of appreciation as implemented by different companies• Material rewards like T-shirts, I Pods, Gift vouchers• Crystal glass cut out trophies• Felicitations at High profile seminars, award trophies, certificates,

Breakfast /Dinner with Global Leaders, Trips of various destinations• Individual recognition programs include appreciation letters, citations,

gift vouchers, paid vacations etc• Publishing of Team pictures along with articles on the team’s

achievement in the newsletter• Award points redeemable for different items like gift vouchers etc• Conferring of various titles like Brand ambassador, Gold star, Silver

star, Platinum star etc.• Honor by sending them to attend a regional, Asian or international

conference or a workshop.• Appreciation letter with Sponsored trip with family.• Based on the tenure of work the value of gift voucher. More Weightage

on the 4rth year of service(a year before gratuity entitlement)

• Cash benefits, merchandizes and certificates on completion of specific tenure in organization (1 to 12 yrs)

• Scholarship to employees for pursuing higher education in their field• Zero attrition incentive to supervisors for maintaining zero attrition• Absenteeism incentive• A letter to the family members from the MD thanking them for their

extra support in employee’s success• Awards announced at a business meet and gift him Welcome Kit: T-

shirt, Certificate and a badge that says I have gone that extra mile, Company flag to put on his / her work station with the message says I have gone that extra mile.

• Framed pictures of outstanding employees to be put in the front office lobby area